Apr 01 | The Third Station: Succor

We all carry crosses of pain with us every day of our lives. Our hope and comfort is that Jesus also carried a cross of pain – not just his own but every cross there has ever been. There’s often a focus on Jesus carrying our sins, but it wasn’t just sin. It was despair, hatred, fear, and giving up. It was the starving Jewish child in the city behind him, the people of Europe ravaged by the Black Death fifteen hundred years later, African slaves, First Nations people in residential schools, German Jews in the gas chambers, the sobbing North American teen contemplating ending his life – even poisoned rivers and dying polar bears, victims of human greed and fear.

Jesus took it all and carried it for all of us – the whole family of the planet earth – willingly. He could easily have used the awesome power that he had used while walking on the water, or stilling the storm…but he did not. God invited God’s self into human existence and drained the cup dry. Christians proclaim that they too are called to carry the cross of the world’s pain and suffering.

Here’s the really amazing part: Jesus actually needed help with this cross. This is a beautiful moment in the passion narrative. Jesus is not Superman. He lays aside his sovereignty in these moments. God is dependent on us in this time and reaches out. There is never a moment when we are not being invited into deeper relationship. God willingly reaches out and says, “Help me. Teach me how to close the gap between you and me.” In this way, Jesus is like a lover. In this period of Lent we can ask ourselves where we are being invited into deeper relationship with God through helping others, the faces of Christ.